Of Plasma Channels and Vacuum: Defeating Unbeatable Avada Kedavra
by Mercurial Weather
Summary: All spells are created by wizards and what a human being can create another one can undo. By understanding the nature of Avada Kedavra we can beat it. Join me in exploring the magical world of plasma channels, lasers, wavelength, amplitude, interference and force carrier bosons in Harry Potter.


Of Plasma Channels and Vacuum: Defeating Unbeatable _Avada Kedavra_.

"_There was a flash of blinding green light and a rushing sound, as though a vast, invisible something was soaring through the air- instantaneously the spider rolled over onto its back, unmarked, but unmistakably dead…__So that is how his parents had died… exactly like that spider" J. K. Rowling in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2000)_

_AN: I follow a methodology of ethical inquiry, but if you want to be spared the ethics and get right into the science behind Avada Kedavra, you are welcome to go right to a paragraph in bold that starts with __**Anyways, having determined the why and the if-I-should, and being as ready to face consequences as I will ever be. I'll pick up the gauntle**__**t**__** and try to defeat the unbeatable killing curse: Avada Kedavra with something other than a voluntary human sacrifice**_

I have two kids, eldest girl is in college, she is a Gryffindor, studying physics like daddy and the youngest is an eleven year old boy. I first read the HP novels when it came out. I was in my twenties and I read it along with my eldest daughter: Kaze. Recently I am rereading them with my youngest son Sparrowhawk. I enjoyed it both times in very different ways. I'm convinced that no one ever reads the same book, a book is a collaborative effort between the author and the reader. No two readers can ever read it in the very same exact way. No single reader can read the same book twice either, your outlook changes as much as you change, me at twenty is not the same me as I am at forty. The HP that I read with Kaze is not the HP I'm reading with Sparrowhawk. I wouldn't have thought to play along when I read it the first time. It was a child's book and I couldn't think of it in any other way. Back in my twenties I was just landing from the Icarus fly that were my teenage years. I was trying to get a college degree, I had a little girl and a full time job. I was building an adult life on the fast track and my reality was kind of frail. I had to cling to reality for dear life. I can afford to be so much more flexible today.

I'm game and, by Sparrowhawk's request, I'm prepared to get serious and really think about the nature of magic in HP from a Sci-Fi perspective, heavy on the Sci as my family likes it. The description of the killing curse quoted above as well some family brainstorming sessions during a couple of game nights have persuaded us that we know how to defeat _Avada Kedavra. _Yeah, some families play monopoly, we speculate on fermions, bosons, wavelengths, plasma, lasers, vacuum and their relationship with the magic in Harry Potter. And, in case you wonder, nope, we are not all Ravenclaws. Hubby is Slytherin, Kaze is Gryffindor, Sparrowhawk is Hufflepuff, and I am Ravenclaw. We are all geeks and proud, though.

We are convinced that we can defeat _Avada Kedavra _first because anything man created can be man destroyed, and spells are created by wizards. We are also convinced it can be defeated because we think it is made up of a dazzler green laser that stunts and blinds the victim, another high energy electrolaser acting as a direct energy weapon (think of a giant Taser) and a femtosecond laser combined with a nanosecond laser or a microwave ray to make a sustainable plasma channel to conduct the electricity in the atmosphere all fired "simultaneously" with a wand in what appears as a single deathly ray that seems impossible to block or counterspell. However, some characteristics of it have persuaded us that the spell can be undone, if you are powerful and quick enough, without anyone needing to lay their life in sacrifice. I will explain our reasoning, but first, in the honored tradition of the House of G, let us examine the merits of our inquiry from an ethical perspective.

After making some really poor choices during my teenage years, nowadays I try to do everything with ethics in mind, even fantasizing. I think that if you start giving yourself permission to be lax in one aspect of your life, at some point you are going to end up going dark side. I'm not preaching, it is the way I choose to live my life now. I'm not evangelic, I'm not trying to persuade anyone in that regard.

Anyways, for me the first thing I do before doing anything is asking myself: why am I doing it? Having answered that, I usually ask myself if I should do it in a broader sense, my personal reasons may not be enough to inflict my choice on the world, I think it is common decency to pause and wonder about it. You cannot imagine the tragedies that could have been prevented, if we all went about things in that way. Why trying to beat _Avada Kedavra_? You don't know me, but if you did, you would know that the concept of something unbeatable is an almost irresistible invitation for me to try to beat it.

I have all sorts of odd wiring. I'm ASD, that is a diagnosis, mind you, not my horoscope, nor a Jungian personality type. There have been lots of times in my life in which, if it had been possible to take it out of me with a scalpel, I would have gladly done it myself à la Rambo. I have learned to accept and even to love the way I am, but it took time and work to reach that point. As a lot of people with the condition I was initially misdiagnosed. I went from one therapist to the other being called ADDed, OCDed, and dyslexic, you name it. The bottom line was that I got stuck with the label of troubled child. At one point it seemed I was not going to be able to attend regular school, that was my first unbeatable.

Unbeatable is a designation that is often attached to things or people that deserved to be defeated by something other than by bringing the crane, which is what the _Deux ex Machina _used to be in Greek plays, the machine was a crane that took the actor playing god in the _proskenion _(up where the gods dwell) and put him in the _logeion_ (where mortals dwell).I like my solutions to persuade me. I don't like things being imposed or dropped on me. The point here is that unbeatable rubs me the wrong way. Beating the unbeatable killing curse is too much for me to resist.

_Avada Kedavra _is fiction, which makes it a relatively safe unbeatable to tackle. It does not involve too much politics, it does not involve religion, so it is pretty safe topic when it comes to offending sensibilities which, frankly, is not always a deterrent to me. Why should I? Well why shouldn't I? I don't foresee any adverse effects. It is just a fun family game (we are a bit weird).

Facing something armed with partial or askew knowledge can lead you straight into danger. So first ask yourself why you are doing it and then ask yourself if you should do it. Once having answered those two question be prepared to face the consequences, some of which may be unexpected. I think consequences of trying to beat fictional_ Avada Kedavra _are manageable, but I'm prepared for the worst: the unknown. I'm sure there are consequences I cannot foresee right now. Take for example our family experiment in raising our kids under the conviction that ignorance does not keep them safe. I thought I knew what I could expect, boy was I wrong!

I'm fully convinced nothing could have prepared me for Sparrowhawk, but that may be my fatalism speaking. Let us look, for example, at him being sorted into Hufflepuff. His dad was sure he was going to be a Slytherin like him, I was thinking hatstall between Slytherin and Ravenclaw. The child decided on Hufflepuff after looking for all the Pottermore introduction letters. He called it a no brainer.

I couldn't see it at first, but he pointed out that Hufflepuffs get quiet dormitories with bed warmers always ready, his little feet can get ice cold and he doesn't like sleeping with socks. Puffs also get the common room with plants, sunshine and comfy chairs. The fact that no intruders have invaded that basement, not even during the battle of Hogwarts, is another good selling point. Affection being an important part of kid's development, Sparrowhawk says, if he were to leave home, he would only do it to go to a place where he would not only be educated but loved to the standards he has come to expect.

He says when it comes to cuddling he has grown used to a buxom maternal figure and, though I'm irreplaceable in many ways, the closest to that among the four heads in Hogwarts would be Pomona. WTF? The impertinent child dared say I should take that as a compliment! First of all, we are going to have to work on your compliments, if I ever want to have grandchildren. Second, I'm middle-aged with two kids and only ten pounds away from my ideal weight, through a lot of effort 'cause I'm a foodie, swimming off those carbs is not easy child, lesson one in compliments: notice the effort. Third, I have a far better fashion sense than Sprout, anyone who doesn't go around covered in dirt does. But I'll take maternal as a compliment, half a point for the effort.

Sparrowhawk also thinks Hufflepuff is the best house to get the most loyal friends without that much effort. My boy is confident he would love Pomona and her Puffs and that they would love him back, with low maintenance requirements (his words, not mine). I may be biased, but the little runt is lovable and is not above using that as a weapon. Yeah, I've armed our scion with weaponized loveliness, so he won't be defeated by love as Lord Voldemort was. He eats love for breakfast. And I'm partially responsible for unleashing him upon the world. I hope, I sincerely hope that history does not judge us too harshly for that. Defeating _Avada Kedavra_ feels preemptively apologetically.

Sparrowhawk says that, as far as the head of his house is concerned, Puffs can get away with murder as long as they have good reasons to justify their actions, which he thinks he does most of the times. Finally, he likes being underestimated from a purely strategic point of view, he thinks that the kids from the other houses would never see him coming until it is too late (again his words, not mine).

When I challenged his perception of Professor Sprout, he let me read the old introduction letter with blasted Pomona rewarding dueling as a valid way of conflict resolution with a box of coconut ice. I have just one thing to say: Damn it, Sprout! That is a rookie mistake! You never reward wrong behaviors! Attenuating circumstances should diminish the punishment, not invalidate it. If the child thinks he deserves a week of detentions, give him three days at the least, you will look like a queen and the child won't get the impression he can get away with murder. We always let our children decide how long they want to be grounded and, even knowing that we will probably punish them lower than they say, with repeated games and them trying to outsmart us, most of the times they give themselves way more than we would.

Thanks to cuddly Pomona our youngest is the most unlikely Hufflepuff since Tonks. Sprout, you don't know what fate has befallen your house, up your game or be prepared to increase the number of your dark wizards by at least four. He has already sorted his three best friends (two boys and a girl) as Puffs. In fact, expect quite a few more: unlike me, my boy takes after his father and makes friends easily. I don't put it pass him to recruit an army of Puffs to take over the world.

One day it is all fun and games in the common room, you think they are just playing AD&D, drawing maps, moving hand painted figurines on them, so cute… But they are actually going through The Plan. The next you know, a Devil's Snare forest surrounds a building just as a G8 or NATO leader's meeting is taking place. Trained Dragons and modified Dementors that can fill all incoming attackers with warm happy feelings that make it impossible for anyone to launch an effective attack hover over the place. At the same time The Pentagon, The German Federal Ministry of Defense, The French Ministry of the Armed Forces, the Chinese Central Military Commission, the Russian Ministry of Defense and the Indian Ministry of Defense which have already been infiltrated by Puffs using Polyjuice Potion menace to nuke the English Magic Ministry, MACUSA and all key Magical and Muggle governments not already taken over, if they do not surrender immediately and unconditionally to the power of love.

Before you can say midget puffskein, a benevolent ecological global dictatorship of enlightened Puffs that rewards people based on merits and gives to everyone according to their needs is established without firing one single spell and with minimal, if any, nuclear destruction. That launches a golden age which makes _Leto the Worm_'s millennium look like a doll's tea party. And no one thinks of organizing a resistance movement because they are convinced they are happy. Screw freedom, let the nice Puffs call the shots… Then the world really starts working on a space program and pretty soon my boy and his close circle of friends set out to space, seeking out more worlds to "share the love with," while mindless adoration guarantees his hold over the planet now called Alpha Earth remains unwavering. My hubby, his big sis and I are locked someplace where we are kept sedated with whatever version of _soma_ he and his friends can come up with. I like to think he would not use _Imperius _on us. My best friend and my son's godmother is a Hufflepuff who can tie bulls in rodeos so I don't underestimate the badgers. My only hope is the Puffs may prove harder to manipulate than Sparrowhawk thinks. Hope is in the bottom of _Pandora's_ _Bo__x_.

Anyways, my boy has managed to fool Pottermore into making him a Hufflepuff thirty four out of fifty times he has tried, creating different mail accounts under my supervision, through five different IP addresses. He wanted to use something called private VPN service, which I don't very well understand, but for what little I could understand and the cost of it, I said no (it was more of a no way in hell). A mother has to draw the line somewhere. Mind you, he came up with the scheme. And, though, I honestly think it was overkill, I went along with part of it. I'd rather know what he is up to, for reasons that should be readily apparent. I want to be able to see him coming and he gives me a run for my money. He kept the account with the Sparrowhawk Patronus (he is also an Ursula K. Le Guin fan and thinks _Ged_ is the GOAT). He gave the Brown Bear, the Crow and the Wolf to his best friends.

_La virgen nos guarde con Gavilán. _I'm agnostic, but Sparrowhawk drives me to Pascalian prayer more often than I want to admit, half my parenting is done being equally amazed and terrified. Raising Gryffindor Kaze posed other challenges, but I was younger and far more spirited back then. I fear I'm getting too old for keeping up with smart free kids. But it is too late to change gears. Right now I'm trying to follow my boy's unbridled enthusiasm in reading a fic called _Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality._ And I had thought that enforcing his electric bass guitar practice hours so he didn't drive us or the neighbors crazy was going to be the hardest thing that I was going to face this year.

Hubby wanted to send a henchmen singing telegram, but I managed to persuade him the untraceable method was better, henchmen are not what they used to be, expect a gift in your mailbox… I'm just kidding, the fic is really good. I highly recommend it. I also recommend you have someone you trust who can discuss subjects like death, how we learn, the validity of hermetic knowledge and how self-determination relates to preparedness to deal with consequences, especially if you are in the younger part of the T range. I only have myself to blame for having an anti-censorship, everything is negotiable within reason policy in regards to what my kids are allowed to read. You can't read it because it may raise uncomfortable epistemological issues I was not yet prepared to discuss with my eleven year old son is not considered a good reason in my house. It is times like this I wish I'd left the: _it is so because I say so and I know better _backdoor open…

**Anyways, having determined the why and the if-I-should, and being as ready to face consequences as I will ever be. I'll pick up the gauntle****t**** and try to defeat the unbeatable killing curse: Avada Kedavra with something other than a voluntary human sacrifice** (I'll say more on that later).

My Gryffindor, Slytherin and Hufflepuff were already ready to go. So first things first: Have you ever wondered what the magic in HP looks like when compared to our world? OK, we know people like to say our imagination is limitless. This very site's motto is unleash your imagination. Sorry if we break illusions, imagination is bounded. One caveat, the powers of your mind go so much further than mere imagination, understood as picturing things with images. We can push and push forward the limits of what we can conceive and deduce. However, chances are you don't get a pretty picture of what happens inside a black hole, powerful ideas and intuitions tend not to be photogenic, which is why a lighted up tube with gas can disappointing people accustomed to Hollywood quality visual effects.

Let us explain what we mean when we say that what we can imagine is bounded with some examples: Cthulhu looks like an octopus a MF badass octopus, granted, but in the end an octopus is an octopus. Vampires suck blood just like bats. Most aliens are insect-like or reptilian. Sirens are women with fish tails and unicorns are horses with a horn. So, what does the magic in HP resembles the most of the world around us? In short, let us start by looking for the horse.

Using mainly the books and Pottermore (the movies are not really helpful) and focusing on spells and charms to deduce things about magic in general, we think we can make a compelling case. We are leaving potions on the side, because it is our assumption that what applies to charms will not necessarily apply to potions because one deals with energy and the other deals in matter. For what we can glean out of it, potions and alchemy work a lot like chemistry works in our world. The core of chemistry is bonding: atoms exchanging electron valentines or charged ions being attracted to their opposites. I think it is kind of a pity, I love alchemy prettiest granddaughter: it can be toxic, it can be healing, it can be delicious and it can go boom boom, it is like the best kind of story. But I agree that we don't have to address it here in depth. We are also leaving out transfiguration because we think that most spells and charms affect bosons (radiation) while transfiguration and potions affect fermions (matter). This is a simplified, verily so, vision of it, but we think it is enough for what we intend to do.

We might have managed to confuse you, bear with us, we are not trying to. You could take our word on it. In my case it would be a loop of faith, because I'm a loopy or you can keep reading and let us convince you. If that last statement did not make sense to you, don't worry: it just has to do with the concept of space, time and the four forces of the universe Kaze and I adhere to for the moment. And it has to do with the epistemological model of acquiring knowledge we are all comfortable with. It also has some bearing on the matter of well matter and energy. Hubby and Sparrowhawk are into String Theory, by the by.

First, I'll try to explain why we think transmutation and potions vs spells and charms deal with two different kinds of magic and my family agrees we only need to look at one to tackle _Avada Kedavra_. OK, keeping it real simple: the world is made of particles. Particles are really small things that build atoms that build everything else. I won't delve long on electrons, protons and neutrons, because this is a T fic and my kids learned about atoms in preschool. But I may be introducing you, very superficially, to two concepts that can seem new but aren't: fermions and bosons. Are these new divisions of the atom or some arcane entities kept by obscure hermetic sects of physicist decked in black robes doing eldritch rituals in the CERN that could end up blowing up our whole reality in pursue of unholy knowledge? No they aren't, we are still talking about the same things my kids learned with marshmallows and chocolates in preschool: electrons, protons and neutrons.

Fudge, now I desperately crave s'mores! I swear that I'm so easy to sway when it comes to food that it is just ridiculous! That is why when I diet, I don't watch adds. Of course the moment I say s'mores my whole family wants them...I'll be right back, after I get a platter, some milk for Sparrowhawk and espressos for the rest of us (we are caffeine addicts, don't judge us, we have multifarious interests and no time turners we need caffeine to function properly).

Now let's start with the concept of fermion which can apply to any three of the particles but was historically first developed to describe how electrons dance around the atom. Describing how electrons move and what they can do or not is a good part of quantum mechanics and that is what the concept of fermion does, addresses and explains the behavior of an especial type of electron as described by Fermi-Dirac statistics. And the concept is not all that new: Around the time Newt Scamander was running around NY with his nifflers, Enrico Fermi and Paul Dirac were developing statistics to explain how identical particles with half-integer spins behave in a system with thermodynamic equilibrium.

I've already done a very simple explanation of thermodynamics and its implications on the direction of time in another rant, so I won't repeat myself here. It is amazing how many interesting concepts are derived or affected by the same principles that apply to how you heat your cup of tea or coffee. To understand the relevance of the concept of thermodynamic equilibrium let me tell you that it is an axiomatic premise. And what that means is that something is assumed unquestioningly in some models of reality to make them easier to explain. Not really unquestioningly, mind you, more of a: I'm-not-messing-around-with-that-for-now sort of way, mainly because your model takes it as a given that a particular feature of reality does not affect your experiment critically.

Yeah, this may come as a surprise, but models do not take everything in reality into account. Because a model of reality that is the size of reality is as useless as a map that had to be the same size of the place being described. Models and maps are always schematic. So when coming up with an explanation of any phenomena, you have to choose which features of reality are important to explain it and which aren't. You are not aiming for an explanation that considers all possible variables, you are aiming for something that helps you think it out in a limited scope, but hoping to choose just the right variables that hit the core of the question, so then you can generalize it. You want your map to be schematic but accurate enough so it gets you where you are going. You don't have to depict every blade of grass, you may not even have to say that there is grass there, but you need to be precise about streets.

In the case of fermions you start by assuming a system in which there are no net marcroscopic flows of matter or energy in the system or between systems: what is in stays in and nothing new gets in from the outside. Within such system fermions are electrons with half-integer spins, which is to say that they move a certain way within the orbits around the nucleus of the atom they belong to. You are probably aware that ever elusive individual electrons cannot be pinpointed exactly in their orbits, which is called the Principle of Indeterminacy. And that is why electrons are the subject of statistical analysis; because even if we cannot locate them exactly, the probability of them being in certain places and states is something that we can describe in mathematical functions called wavefunctions. Sometimes saying something is somewhere around there and it cannot possibly do that is as good as it gets with knowledge. But knowing that is a very good start to understand how the universe works.

Back in Fantastic Beasts times Pauli, Fermi and Dirac described such wavefunctions for fermions and postulated that they obey something called the Pauli Exclusion Principle, which states that two or more identical fermions cannot occupy the same quantum state within a quantum system. Leptons and quarks, the building blocks of matter are fermions. You might wonder what implications this has to your everyday life: well, this principle explains why in real life you cannot turn lead into gold. It gives a certain stability or rigidity to matter. It allows us to have Tom Lehrer droll Periodic Table song, without it, we would have an anything goes universe and there couldn't be a periodic table with atoms swapping electrons as they very well pleased… Imagine if your ice cream could turn into a lump of coal and then into a steel bullion for no apparent reason.

Chemistry would be a lot harder if our electrons were into free love. We would all be learning transmutation because being in different simultaneous quantum states would bring about a world that could make psychedelic look yawn boring. I like a certain order to things: so just let me say that I thank the ancient gods this is not how our universe works and the electrons in our matter bond in orderly fashion, we are not hippies. By the by, my hubby is a hippie and I love him, lots, so that is just me joking; obscurely like a Ravenclaw is supposed to. Hubby is also a physicist and I thank him for taking his consulting fees in s'mores. He might be a hippie, but he is a Slytherin, of course he wasn't doing it for free. It shows how much he really loves me that he states his fees up front.

Our claim is that our model of _Avada Kedavra _doesn't have to worry about the mistreatment of Fermi-Dirac statics in the HP universe, so we can ignore it for the time being: both in the case that fermions work the way they normally do (potions) and when they are hippies (transmutations). Just one final thought before we leave transmutations and potions on the side. What happens to matter if you relax the premise of thermodynamic equilibrium? Say you throw some more energy in the system, for example, you submit it to heat, to cold, to extreme crushing force: then the rigidity of matter caves, it is transformed, that works in our universe too. In chemistry by adding energy to the once stable system you change the matter present, but the matter does not spin into everlasting changing, it goes back to equilibrium once the energy is spent, we live in an entropic universe where you have to keep pouring energy to keep things working (refer to the thermodynamics rant).

The only thing that convinces me of the viability of the HP universe is that transmutation requires energy to be poured in and that in most cases it is not permanent for it makes demands on the wizard or witch transmuting matter. Now let us say bye-bye to Professor McGonagall and Professor Snape, and say hello to Professor Flitwick, who is kind of my favorite and not only because he is the head of my house: long live Rowena, she has been dead for ages but it is the thought that counts with us ravens.

Let us turn our attention to bosons. Bosons are particles with an integer spin and are not subject to Pauli Exclusion Principle, which as you might have already surmised means that any number of identical bosons can occupy the same quantum state, mind you those energy states are discrete at a thermodynamic equilibrium. Bosons are particles that can be in the same state and can aggregate in all sort of interesting cohesive ways, like in a laser or a superfluid or a Bose-Einstein condensate. Now these particles are explained by the Bose-Einstein statistics which were also developed by Satyendra Nath Bose and Albert Einstein around the time Gellert Grindewald was impersonating Percival Graves. Oh and the name boson was coined by Dirac as homage so no, Satyendra was not a narcissist.

What properties do bosons have? There are several, but we want to focus on two: 1) Bosons add up, the statistics that describe them tell us that identical bosons will lump or congregate, they are gregarious little guys. OK, the statistics don't tell us in what particular quantum state we will find them congregating, even in a lump they remain unpredictable. Quantum states again have to do with probability distributions for the value of each observable measure in the system we are trying to describe. We still don't know the outcome but we know bosons are going to stick together. 2) Bosons with the same energy can occupy the same place in space so that often makes them force carriers or messenger particles. They are often bundles of energy called quanta and they give raise to forces between other particles. Quanta or bundles of energy bundle in particular kinds of fields: electric goes with electric, electromagnetic go with electromagnetic.

Let us examine the second property closely: Bosons have wavefunctions too. Those wavefunctions are fluctuating probabilistic functions that tell you were the elusive electron is likelier to be in a given atom. Now the energy of a wave in a field is quantized (bundled) and the excitations of the field can be interpreted as particles. Say what? Think about balls in a billiard table, those are your particles, the cue stick is the momentum and the way one ball hits the other and moves it is called excitation. There are some pool games in which you hit the balls with one single ball, let us call that ball intermediary or virtual particle. The job of that virtual particle is to convey the forces of the field to other particles. Nuclear force and Electromagnetic force can be thought out as exchanges or excitations of virtual particles, balls hitting balls in the pool table. Yeah, nuclear bombs are not as cute as billiard balls hitting each other, but the point is that the carriers of force behind those reactions are bosons.

There is a particular kind of boson for every one of the three forces in the Standard Model of the Universe. The remaining force: gravity gives physicist all sorts of headaches, there is no conclusive proof of the supposed boson type it should have: the graviton. And the question has physicists siding in clearly divided groups that are as fierce in their mistrust of each other's way of looking at the world as Muggleborns and Pure Bloods are: those who believe in Loop Quantum Theory and those who believe in String Theory, even though both are on the same team of looking for Quantum Gravity. I've already said I'm with the loopies. I'm a practical soul, and I find it acceptable to use something that explains a little bit of the universe temporally until we come up with something better. I have nothing against those who favor String Theory, I sleep with one nightly and have born him children. But I'll say no more of this rather divisive subject for my mom taught me not to discuss these topics in public forums.

At least theoretically, through bosons as virtual particles we could describe all four forces or interactions of the universe. These forces are: gravity which acts between objects with mass, the weak nuclear force that is responsible for radioactive decay, the strong nuclear force that holds quarks within the protons and the neutrons in the atomic nuclei together and the electromagnetic force that acts between electrically charged particles. All other forces of the universe can be described with those four. Yeah, the force is strong in bosons. Sorry, couldn't help myself.

It is easy to think of fermions as the constituents of matter and of bosons as particles that transmit interactions (force carriers) and are constituents of radiations. Mind you, as we've already said that is a gross oversimplification. And we only use it here to keep to the scope of the rant. The properties of bosons explain all forces interacting between particles in the universe. Their properties are in turn explained by Bose-Einstein statistics. And spells and charms can be explained as interactions in the context of those four fundamental forces and those derived by them. Even spells that seem to affect matter like _Reparo_ or _Scourgify_ can be explained as interactions of forces as long as the matter is not created from thin air, I haven't found all the exceptions to Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfigurations anywhere canon, but since appearing things from thin air seems to relate to transfigurations and we have agreed those related to fermions, our assumptions on bosons hold. We can just focus on bosons for our model of _Avada Kedavra._

In HP the spells or charms have some very interesting characteristics. We will use those terms interchangeably, though traditionally spells are spoken and charms are artifacts: In the very first book we learn that they are typically cast with words and specific wand movements. We also learn that the way the words to cast them are pronounced is important. Through the books we see them physically shoot out of wands which are wooden sticks with cores of highly magical substance that hold the potential magic as repositories until a spell liberates it. We also learn that as the wizards and witches get more skilled and or are more powerful, they can cast without wands and without actually pronouncing words. This magic can be, in some instances, reflected by magical shields, it is deflected by obstacles and at times refracted according to the density of the medium they travel through, for example an elastic and dense medium like water renders some spells ineffectual. Spells also have counterspells. Magic can drain those who cast it, if they have to put too much effort on it. How does that sound like?

What is the first thing in this world that all those characteristics of spells and charms in HP make you think about? If you said energy moving in waves then we are birds of a feather. Magic is within wizards and witches as potential energy and it gets channeled by will to affect the outer world… It is very telling of our outlook that, even if the writer has no formal scientific training, when she thought of the horse to turn into a unicorn, the horse is energy. Yeah, disclaimer I don't think that J.K. Rowling was actually describing laser beams and a microwave rays when she came up with her _Avada Kedrava_; I am just saying that the spirit of the times made her describe it that way. Zeitgeist is a bitch and it owns us all. Our imagination is bounded by the spirit of our time.

Allow me a little detour for my own amusement. I love fairy tales, perhaps not for the usual reasons: they give me insight on people's dreams through the ages and dreams are one of the most telling ways of finding people's cosmology. In antiquity magic is pretty indistinguishable from nature, shamans conjure animal spirits, they summon the wind, the sun, the lighting, and the fury of the storm the world was pretty befuddling, you didn't need to embellish it to be magical. If you look for medieval fairy tales the magic is iconoclastic like cathedrals: stone like impressive and blown up, defying or aiding god but always material. Castles grow from the mountain, armies rise from the soil, swords raise from lakes. In the seventeen century with Perrault you have magical slippers, talking cats and witches putting princess under eternal sleep, but even if there still are fairies, and witches and magical beings clearly defined, it is a case of how the mighty have fallen, magic is now at the service of the marriage market. A couple of centuries later the Grimm brothers expunged some of the brutality of earlier tales, like their Briar Rose (Perrault's Sleeping Beauty) completely missing the cannibalistic ogre mother in law in the second part of the story. The magic also becomes something more diffuse, fairies are a somewhat diluted presence because they were Victorian gentlemen playing the folklorists and fairies are for children, rational adults don't believe in them... And then comes our time when magic is thought of as bosons sharing excitations… That makes me feel warm inside.

Back to topic. You might wonder: why isn't magic a new form of particle interaction? Why not a new force with its own virtual particle? Is it really that farfetched to theorize a gandalphoton? Hubby wanted merlion, Kaze wanted albuson and Sparrowhawk wanted gedon but since there is no consensus and I'm doing the writing, it will be gandalphoton for the time being.

Anyways, we don't think it is necessary to imagine magic as a new form of particle interaction. We've gone through every spell in the novels and those shown in the movies, we've read all the spells descriptions in Pottermore (we get a bit crazy in family night) and so far we haven't found any that cannot be explained with the four particle interactions already at our disposal. Favoring parsimony, since we don't need a new force to explain the spells we already know, including _Avada Kedrava,_ we won't seek one… for now. We think relaxing that might prove interesting in regards to transmutations and how voluntary human sacrifices can counteract the curse, but we will leave that out for now.

There are two intriguing characteristics of _Avada Kedrava_: shields like _Protego _don't work and there is no counterspell. The first one relates to one characteristic of waves: refraction. That is what a shield essentially does, a wave is traveling in one direction in a medium and when it goes into another medium its propagation direction is changed. How much? It depends on the medium and the type of wave you are talking of. The wave-like quality of spells may explain why some don't work well underwater, water is a very elastic and dense substance, it has a high concentration of matter and the chances your wave-like spell is going to collide and be deflected or reflected increase.

But _Avada Kedrava_ is made of a wave that does not easily changes its mind, when we talk about lasers in a few paragraphs we will see why one characteristic of lasers which is they are monochromatic in one single wavelength, make them harder to change their propagation direction significantly more than other types of light. And their radiance makes it hard to lower their intensity rapidly enough. Though lasers can be dispersed, especially by something called a perfect mirror, we will look at all of it latter

Now, for the counterspell: I think that has to do with interference and the fact that spells do behave like waves. First let us look at waves. Remember the discussion on bosons when we said they were bundled by types of fields? Waves tend to stay and influence within a type too. First, what are waves? Waves in physics are understood as disturbances in fields and they may either be repeatedly oscillatory (like the waves crashing into a beach) or propagating from each point to the neighboring points (like when you throw a stone in the water and it makes circles). In our world the most typical waves are mechanical (a local strain is propagated from one particle into another like an earthquake or sound waves) or electromagnetic (a combination of variable electric or magnetic fields). There are combination of the both types too. So waves can combine, but within certain rules.

Waves have several parameters but I will focus on amplitude and frequency. If you draw a wave with the typical mound up and mound down graph, you can think of the amplitude as the measure of the oscillation from the lowest point or the midpoint of your graph to the highest point of the crest, depending of the definition you use. More amplitude means that it goes from very high to very low, less means your graph is flatter. Amplitude measures how much energy is carried by the wave, the higher the amplitude the more energy the wave carries.

Frequency is how much they oscillate, the number of cycles. High frequency in the same undulation graph will mean you have a lot of peaks, the oscillation is faster. Low frequency will mean you have less peaks, the oscillation is slower. Refer to your graph once more, wavelength measures the space from peak to peak or valley to valley of two consecutive bell shapes. Wavelength relates to frequency and can be thought of as a spectrum that orders types of electromagnetic waves from the lower to the higher frequencies ranges. We can talk of bands, I bet you know a few like microwaves, infrared, x-rays, gamma rays and the good all rainbow. They all have specific characteristics and different energy release and interactions with matter. We will use this feature to explain why a green dazzler ray makes a lot of sense because of the wavelength that renders the color green is within a relatively high wavelength of 495-570nm, it is inexpensive and stable, it is not easy to deflect so it is a very sensible wavelength for a dazzler weapon.

There are essentially two types of waves, ones which can move through suitable mediums or ones that can move without needing a medium even in vacuum. But all can also move through each other. Picture two wavy lines and then make them move through each other, this means that at some points they occupy the same space and time, but that is OK if they are bosons, because those guys are all into adding up. One very interesting feature of waves is that when they are added the amplitude of the waves adds too. This creates an interesting interaction between waves, something called interference, which can be either constructive or destructive. Yeah, constructive interferences sounds weird, but bear with me.

Imagine that your wave graphs have the same frequency and are traveling in the same direction, make it simple, draw two graphs with three humps of the same size, now imaging them overlapping point by point that is called being in phase. The resulting wave looks pretty much the same, but the amplitude is larger and the wave carries more energy. That is precisely what constructive interference is; there is strength in joining forces. Now imagine the frequency is still the same, but when the first wave goes up, the second wave goes down as if they were mirror images. They are out of phase in 180 degrees, if you add them up, since they go in opposite directions, they will cancel each other out, and the amplitude will be zero. That is called destructive interference. It is like pulling a cart in two different directions, no matter how hard each person pulls one will hinder the other and if they have the same strength the cart won't move. We think that is how counterspells work.

Now, let us got back to the two types of waves, the ones which need a medium to travel and the ones that don't and can travel anywhere, even in vacuum. Sound is of the first kind and electromagnetic (EM) waves are of the later. Can sound waves affect EM fields? If they could it may explain why pronouncing spells just right is important. OK, this side of the mirror sound waves are mechanical. Now, can mechanical waves affect EM fields? If you are into very classic physics you have to answer no. However, even under that view sounds may affect EM, sound waves at the right frequency with high energy can affect photon wavelength and change the color of light. Also researchers in Japan and Germany have effectively converted sound waves into electromagnetic waves, they did it by trapping a spin current in between metal plates, but we only have wood in most instances in the novels. So can we get around that? We could contrive it and say that somehow microscopic metal shavings float when you say Leviosa just right or we could use the chemical vat any human body is to say that the chemicals and electricity within you is enough to create an electromagnetic field, but let us do something better.

Join me in pushing the boundaries of speculation. Remember we said everything in the universe can be explained by the four forces? Well, that is the aspiration, so far we don't have a theory of everything. Regular mechanics and quantum mechanics don't mix well and gravity is not part of the Standard Model. Within the aspiration of a theory of everything, mechanics should be explained through the fundamental forces, mainly gravity and electromagnetism. So far physicist have tried but have been unable within the current theoretical framework to do this well. However, there are some very interesting insights in recent studies of the relationship between elasticity and electromagnetism.

Oddly enough the relationship between elasticity and electromagnetism is implicit in theoretical framework that has been around since the beginning of the twentieth century. But it wasn't until we began pursuing a theory of everything that things fell in place. The idea has been around but it has been developed beyond an intriguing thought experiment in a lecture in the Albert Einstein institute in February 2nd 2018. If proven in the lab it will challenge our concept of General Relativity and Gauge Theory. And that is well outside the scope of this humble rant. So against my grain: Take my word on it. It may be that in the near future, if the mathematical relationship is proven, then we may have a very nice implication for HP: sound waves are elastic waves and if they can be explained within Maxwell's electromagnetism equations then it could very well be that the way you say Leviosa can indeed affect the outcome of a spell through constructive interference by increasing the energy adding up two waves which are essentially of the same kind.

We have almost all the building blocks to our model to defeat _Avada Kedavra._ We have wavelengths, we have destructive interference. We have bosons and a certain intuitive idea of how energy works. Now let us talk lasers. Laser is an acronym: Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation. OK, so lasers are light, but a very special kind of light because of their coherence. We could complicate this a great deal but the implication of that coherence is that it is released in a narrow beam with very high irradiance and low divergence; it is a very concentrated beam that can be sustained for a long distance and that won't be reflected or deflected easily. They also have temporal coherence, which basically means they are just one color on they maintain within a wavelength. If you pass them through a prism they won't turn into unicorns and rainbows, they are obstinate MF waves. It is not easy to interfere a laser, so that may explain why normal shield spells don't work and why there is no counterspell.

We are missing one more building block of our model and that is plasma. Plasma is one of the four fundamental states of matter. If you subject a neutral gas to a strong electromagnetic field the gas ionizes and becomes increasingly electric conductive. Ionizing means that an atom or molecule acquires a charge: positive or negative. High temperatures are usually required to sustain ionization and if you have matter arranged by charge then transporting charge through it is easier.

We think that the killing curse is composed of several laser: one within the green spectrum that is used to blind and disorient the victim, a femtosecond laser to "instantaneously" create a column of plasma through which electricity can travel. What do I mean with instantaneously? A femtosecond is one millionth of a billionth of a second and a femtosecond laser emits pulses that last only a few tens of femtoseconds. There is another nanosecond (one thousand-millionth of a second) laser to create an almost simultaneous burst that sustains the plasma path. Atmosphere is a natural insulator, but in plasma electrons are in higher concentrations which makes air conductive. And if you use a microwave beam you can make the plasma channel even more durable. A high intensity electrolaser delivers the shock, that is what kills you. What you see is a single green beam that is traveling in less than a second. The plasma channel, the laser coherence and the green spectrum makes it almost impossible to deflect or block and it kills you very efficiently. It would also explain why it is not used as a really long range weapon, sustaining the plasma channel is doable in between relatively close point x and y. Regardless it really sounds pretty unbeatable, but in its construction it carries the key to its defeat.

It all depends on the plasma channel. If you don't have a highly conductive, ionized plasma path in the air through which the killing shock can travel, at the very worse you will be stunned or blinded by the dazzler. You have a chance to stop it. The laser may be hellishly fast, but it has to be triggered by a wizard. If you happen to know or think that the wizard in front of you is going to cast _Avada Kedavra _and if you are a quick draw and powerful enough to create a vacuum around your opponent you may defeat the killing curse.

What is vacuum? Well it means as little matter as possible, ideally no matter, however, absolute vacuum does not exist even in space, a working definition of vacuum on Earth is lower than atmospheric pressure. What you are aiming at is that the number of molecules present in your battle field do not allow the wizard or witch trying to kill you to create the plasma channel. The green light effect will look as if the spell was cast in full, you may be stunned, but not dead by the electric shock.

Very well, vacuum is tricky. Apparently magic in general does not allow you to travel to space so it may be the case that magic is the type of wave dependent on a medium. Curious. That poses several interesting questions and may challenge our assumptions regarding at least some type of bosons being involved in charms, because electromagnetic waves don't need a medium and work well in vacuum, unless there are a mixed wave but that requires thinking of a magic boson, so for now we skip it.

It may not be that all magic doesn't work in space, imagine for a second this only pertains to apparating and disapparating, I mean traveling without being able to go back is pretty convincing to make the statement: magic doesn't allow you to travel into space. However, put that thought on hold and let us focus on this question: Does the fact that at least some magic does not work in vacuum mean that magic cannot be used to create a vacuum? My first answer would be not necessarily. But let us analyze how we create vacuum without magic first and see if that is consistent with the spells we do know.

Want to create vacuum: easy grab a suction cup, press it on the table and inside the cup the pressure will be lower than the atmospheric pressure, you have created vacuum. For experiments in an enclosed environment you can create vacuum with a pump by extracting the air inside the enclosure. Grab a bottle and a big syringe, make sure the bottle nuzzle is airtight and then use the syringe to take the air out, you have created vacuum, imperfect in the sense of not stable but you only need it to last less than a second. You can create shields, even if for some reason you cannot pump air out rapidly enough (willing your magic to be like a giant vacuum cleaner) you could in theory manipulate your field to create a suction cup effect, which would also knock out your enemy, assuming they need air to breathe and you rarefied the air around them for long enough, not to mention the sudden change in pressure can induce shock too. Which serves you just well as you don't want them casting the spell again.

That begs the question: Exactly how much vacuum you need to prevent the plasma channel in the curse from forming, as I said the atmosphere is naturally non-conductive so the world is going to be working in your favor there. But to answer that would require some _in vivo_ testing. Mind you, in order to save my life I would probably go along with it. I would get a good amount of test subjects, create vacuum, measure the pressure, cast the killing curse and see what works. I hope I don't get kicked out of here for suggesting this, but the best animal models for respiratory distress are pigs, followed by mice. And yeah, there are studies about the best animal models according to the system or organ you want to study. And no, I'm not a pig hater, I rather like pigs. And we are ovo-lacto vegetarian. Again, we are not actually conducting experiments here, but if I were a wizard intent on saving lives I would use the best animal model I could to reproduce effects in humans so my choice would probably be the pig, for size and anatomic and physiological likeness, as it would require less fine tuning afterwards.

I know this method depends on having enough power to create vacum over the dark wizard trying to kill you with lighting fast speed, so in all likelihood it won't work for everybody. But it could work for someone fast and powerful enough. Now why would you go through so much trouble for a one on one duel, when we have seen _Avada Kedavra_ actually defeated by a block of marble?

Yeah, you might wonder why not start by being practical. The killing curse is actually not unbeatable, people other than HP survive it. OK, not a direct hit, but the gist is: don't get hit by it. Duh. Let us look at the single duel we have actually witnessed in HP between really powerful wizards. And sorry, Harry mostly swings it on a _Deux ex Draco_ to kill Voldemort, so he is out of the equation. Also sorry but Hermione and Ron are also out of depth when facing really powerful wizards, they all end up playing damsel in distress when they do. The top Death Eater's dogs are all killed or stopped by adult members of the Order of the Phoenix. And the only one who gives Voldemort a run for his money in a duel is Albus Dumbledore. Hubby and I love the HP kids, we really admire their braveness, resilience and ethics, but we are going for facts and in fighting skills they don't come top tier. I think it is good that event though they are hurt by life, they cannot cast unforgivable curses, that requires adult hate.

Let's talk about the duel in the Ministry atrium. Again, we are going with the duel in the book because the movie works either with the supposition that Tom Riddle didn't bother _Avada Kedavra-ing_ Albus the moment he laid eyes on him or that Albus actually used a red counterspell against _Avada Kedavra_. Hollywood quality visuals don't necessarily make sense or follow workable rules.

OK, in the book Tom Riddle pulls the big guns, he is not Gilderoy Lockheart trying to show the world he is the most amazing wizard duelist ever. Riddle is going for the kill and his killing curses get wasted on destroying statues and poor Fawkes. I'm wondering if the first curse was the killing curse too, because if you can simply _apparate_ and _disaparate_, well that is not much of an unbeatable. And it also supports our laser hypothesis because lasers hitting solid objects can harm those objects but they don't continue traveling in the same beam as before, the solid object absorbs the harm and the light. Plus so far there are no homing lasers so that would also work with our model of _Avada Kedavra_.

Riddle is genuinely amazed that Albus didn't _Avada Kedavra-ed_ right away or feigns it well. Yet he was hoping to block the spell with his silvery shield? If you are not supposed to be able to block it, why use the silvery thingy? Is the silvery shield a perfect mirror that could disperse even a monochromatic single wave like a laser rendering it ineffectual? I mean, if you are a psychopath who doesn't give a fig about who gets hit, ally or foe, by the deflected beam that can work just fine as long as the silvery substance is not actually silver which is very conductive and not a thing to use against electroshock… We would love a chat with the psycho on that one.

What we do know is that Riddle is forced to retreat without having killed. We also know that the duel between Albus and Gellert ended with both of them alive. So apparently in singular combat among really powerful wizards the killing curse is not all that effective. Or is it? Grown up wizards are scared of it, enough not to make an organized resistance against the Death Eaters. Why? We think it is because most grown up wizards are not powerful enough to withstand it or produce it consistently. Unbeatable often means unbeatable by most.

Furthermore, the killing curse works at its best in confrontations between multiple enemies, then it makes the most damage both in terms of casualties and terms of moral. That is how a bunch of wackos with killing intent and masks take over a whole country without people facing them heads on. I can understand why long lived wizards are weary of loosing a century of prospective life. I also understand not everyone is willing to use killing force against killing force. You have to really mean it and most people are hesitant to kill. What I cannot figure out is why, coming after two wars the wizarding world has no professional army. The Order of the Phoenix is a guerrilla, not an army. They are a handful of people not scared mindless by having to confront people who are willing to torture, brainwash and kill. But the Magic Ministry sounds like a sitting duck. Sorry, I'm a social scientist and that makes no sense to me (after dropping out of med school, I decided social interactions are something I have been kind of studying from the outside for my whole life and dived right into it).

Here is the thing, our little family is very much aware of all this. Defeating _Avada Kedavra_ is defeating it in great numbers. That is a big shot at the moral of those using it. Imagine, the single most powerful weapon at your disposal, the go to curse does no longer work. Can you picture the Death Eaters scampering like rats in front of an army that can beat the unbeatable? And by army I mean a couple of _centuria_ of highly trained wizards and witches. You don't need much more if you go by the numbers of an all out endgame battle of Hogwarts. I can very easily see most dark wizards surrendering, not wanting to engage such an army. I can also easily see that army turning around and defeating the key Ministries. Which makes me wonder how in hell did Gellert Grindelwald lost? Is it really that hard to find a couple of hundreds of really powerful wizards and witches? Is magic so rare?

So what good is a solution that can only be used by the very fast and the very powerful? I think I might have found a way to circumvent that with a charm (in the classic sense) that uses lots of dragon blood as fuel to increase potential magical power, which can be used by any wizarding foot soldier. Kind of a magical _kalashnikova_ that would be one heck of a weapon for any magic army to have. You could create vacuum easily and send really nasty strong killing curses without having to be a wizard that can appear in chocolate frogs cards. But I'm leaving the full reveal of it to my A-G fic.

I want G to give it to A for his birthday, I'm a romantic at heart and in my fic G is an inventor. And yeah, I am aware G is also a textbook case of APD (narcissism, no remorse, early criminal behavior, poor impulse control, cruelty to peers and animals, poor chupacabra). Though I'm also bidding at BPD diagnosis to explain some of his adult reactions, like disturbed sense of identity (he plays a role for each an every person he engages with), black-and-white thinking (his whole world vision is black and white, no grays), self-harm (whatever he did to his hair, his eyes and his skin while growing up qualifies as self-harm in my book) and severe abandonment issues (his jealous outbursts over a relationship that ended ages ago during his exchanges with Newt, even in Percival Graves disguise, are so disturbing). Not to mention his immediate assumption Dumbledore is romantically involved with an ex-student is verily disturbing too. So I use the term romance laxly. Hubby and I honestly don't understand movie ratings anymore. That is why we have decided to turn to full on parental guidance. Read and watch all you want, just come to us if anything is disturbing. Anyways, APDs can be so charming, especially in fics. I'm also leaving my boosting charm artifact aside because it depends on the assumption that magic is indeed a new kind of particle interaction. If we toy with the notion all sort of interesting things begin happening in the HP universe.

For example: the voluntary human sacrifice. Say for a moment there is actually a gandalphoton or albuson or merlion or gedon. And magic is indeed a new form of interaction among particles. What is the characteristic of magic that stands out from all the stories of wizards we've read? Our answer is will. Even for non-wizard stories will, usually spoken, has power to create. So then making the single most powerful act of choice a consciousness can make: relinquishing existence for others has to bring out the big guns quanta. A laser is impossible to refract, hard to deflect and almost impossible to interfere with in a less than a second, but perhaps the magic ray is easier to block or counterspell. Refraction is in the end about finding the right shield. Maybe you shouldn't focus on the laser or the plasma channel but on the magic that makes them possible.

Or maybe it is not a block but interference. Bellatrix said you have to really mean an unforgivable curse, it also may be the case that the will of sacrifice in opposition to the will of killing creates destructive interference. It may be that murderous hate and selfless love cancel each other out, which would mean they are kind of the same wave only 180 degrees out of phase. There are those who think love and hate are two sides of the same coin. Still, it wouldn't be my first choice to tackle this unbeatable, I would probably try the giant suction cup or vacuum cleaner first. But I'm practical.

I think that is all for this game night, we may want to do something on transmutation and analyze magic as a new form of particle interaction and what that interaction would imply to fermions and other bosons would be interesting, but we will leave it for another time. Next family night we are having a season 2 marathon of _Legion_… We just love that show.

_AN: If the idea of an artificially created plasma channel to carry electricity is interesting to you, we highly recommend you read about the research of Maik Scheller, Norman Born, Weibo Chen and Pavel Polynkin published in Optica Vol.1 Issue 2. __P__p 125-128 (2014) "Channeling the electrical breakdown of air by optically heated plasma filaments." As for green laser dazzlers, as scary as the thought is, they are real, the ones used by law enforcement and the military are not on the highest range of the green wavelength which means they only impair vision temporally and are mainly used as deterrents. But if they were to be at a higher range, they could effectively blind, produce nausea and disorientation. Our take on it is that if your intent is to stun someone in order to kill them, well you are not going to worry about their eyes._


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